OurTupelo

The people. The ocean. The hospitality. The music. The arts.

These are just a few of the reasons why our readers love Mississippi.

At Mississippi Today, we work hard to produce news and resources that keep Mississippians informed and hold our public officials accountable. Why? Because we — like you — love Mississippi.

Over the past six-plus years, Mississippi Today readers have come to rely on coverage that helps them navigate the ups and downs of an ever-changing news cycle. Investigative reporter Anna Wolfe has a passion for amplifying the voices of those in our state who need the most help. Her recent series, The Backchannel, chronicles how former Gov. Phil Bryant used the governor’s office to exploit a dysfunctional welfare system for personal interests.

The stories that matter most to us are the ones that give you answers to the questions no one else is asking.

From famous storytellers to those who are everyday heroes featured in Marshall Ramsey’s Mississippi Stories series, this great state has a host of voices ready to share their unique experiences — and people on the other side ready to listen.

Here’s a recent example of how our public service journalism model allowed us to share a story of a local resident in desperate need of answers:

Earlier this month, we published an article by our community health editor Kate Royals about a 61-year-old Madison resident Frank Dungan, in need of a liver transplant from the state’s only organ transplant program at the University of Mississippi Medical Center. But, because of the ongoing contract dispute between his insurer Blue Cross & Blue Shield of Mississippi and UMMC, he is currently ineligible for a transplant at the hospital. 

Kate’s story detailed the challenges he faced getting answers from both his insurer and UMMC on how to proceed or the outright costs of his procedure. Insurance Commissioner Mike Chaney wrote a letter to BCBS and UMMC attorneys to advocate for Dungan, asking for a response. Our health team continues to cover the ongoing dispute and possible resolutions.

“I chose to work here because of my family and because I believe in Mississippi Today’s mission.” 

Kate Royals, Community Health Editor

So why donate to Mississippi Today? Here’s what some of our members had to say – you might feel the same way: 

“Mississippi is my home. Change is on the horizon. This will require reliable reporting/news.” – Betty D.

“You are providing citizens vital and unbiased information to inform our thinking and actions.” – Mary T.

“I need an honest view of what’s happening in Mississippi.” – Kathie G.

“I want to be a part in building a better Mississippi.” — Meade E.

“All of our member funding goes directly toward our journalism by funding costly records requests…hosting community events…and making sure our staff can care for their families with healthcare and other costs.” 

Alyssa Bass, Product Engagement Coordinator

If you agree with these members that Mississippi needs independent journalism like Mississippi Today, join the crowd by creating a recurring donation of any amount today. 

The post What do you love about Mississippi? appeared first on Mississippi Today.

State Health Officer Dr. Thomas Dobbs has been the face of Mississippi’s COVID-19 response. Mississippi Today reporters Bobby Harrison, Geoff Pender and Will Stribling spoke with Dr. Dobbs about his tenure at the health department, the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization abortion case, and what comes next for him after he leaves the health department in July.

The post Podcast: Dr. Thomas Dobbs discusses his tenure as State Health Officer appeared first on Mississippi Today.

In this episode of Mississippi Stories, Mississippi Today Editor-at-Large Marshall Ramsey sits down with Brigadier General Maxey J. Phillips (Retired) of the Mississippi Air National Guard. Maxey fell in love with aviation early in life as he picked cotton on his family’s Northeast Mississippi farm. He watched as World War 2 training aircraft (AT-6 Texans) buzzed over his head. While they were training future pilots, they also lit a dream in a small boy.

After graduating from Mississippi State with an aeronautical engineering degree, Maxey joined the U.S. Air Force where he trained to fly the Air Force’s newest fighter, the F-4 Phantom. From the Cuban Missile Crisis, to Vietnam, to England and back to Mississippi, Maxey tells stories about his nearly 40-year career in the Air Force.

Those stories include a career-altering conversation with legendary aviator General Chuck Yeager, a near-fatal encounter with a turkey buzzard while flying at 480 knots and his time as the 172nd Airlift Wing Commander in Jackson, Mississippi. Most poignantly for Memorial Day weekend, though, Maxey talks about his fallen comrades and a beloved uncle who died in Vietnam.

Sponsored by the University of Mississippi Medical Center.

The post Mississippi Stories: Brigadier General Maxey J. Phillips (Retired) appeared first on Mississippi Today.

Mississippi’s population is larger and most likely more diverse than what was reported last year in the official 2020 U.S. Census.

Reports that the state lost population during the past decade were incorrect based on follow-up research done by the U.S. Census Bureau.

It is probable, though, based on the Census Bureau’s follow-up work, that most — if not all — of the population growth the state experienced since the 2010 Census was among Mississippi’s racial minority groups.

The bureau, using various types of statistical sampling of households, vital records and other data, released a U.S. Census report earlier this month surmising the population of Mississippi and five other states was undercounted in the official 2020 U.S. Census. There were eight other states with significant overcounts.

Mississippi’s population was undercounted by 4.11%, according to the bureau. Only Arkansas at 5.04% and Tennessee at 4.78% had higher undercounts. The state with the largest overcount was Hawaii at 6.79%.

In the 2020 Census, Mississippi was identified as one of just three states that lost population during the 10 years between official census counts. The state lost about 6,000 people and had a population of 2,961,279, according to the original 2020 Census. So in reality, based on the follow-up reports, the state gained about 100,000 people and has a population of more than 3 million.

A key question is what does the undercount mean for Mississippi? First of all, it was not large enough to result in the state losing one of its four U.S. House seats, which are divvied out to the states based on population. But if the minority population is indeed growing at a faster pace than originally cited in the official 2020 Census, that would mean that in redistricting efforts the minority population would not be fairly represented on the federal, state or local levels.

In addition, the amount of federal funds directed to the state often is based on the official census.

“Hundreds of federal programs use decennial census data in their funding formulas, so if Mississippi had an undercount, it would miss out on its rightful share of funding over the coming decade,” according to the Urban Institute.

The Urban Institute estimated the undercount in Mississippi was 2.59% among African Americans and 2.18% among Hispanics.

According to the Census Bureau, the follow-up, called a post-enumeration survey, is not broken down on the state level to determine undercounts or overcounts within state demographic groups because the sample sizes are not large enough.

But another recent follow-up conducted by the Census Bureau revealed that many minorities were undercounted on the national level. The undercount among African Americans was 3.3%, and 4.99% among Hispanics. The white population was overcounted by 1.64%.

Based on the original 2020 Census, Mississippi’s solely white population declined by 95,791 people from 2010 to make up 56.01% of the total state population. Based on the 2020 Census, the African American population declined 13,940 people to 36.62% of the total population. During the same time period, the percentage of Mississippians identifying as other than solely white or African American was 3.85% in 2010 and was 7.36% of the total population in the original 2020 Census.

It is reasonable to assume the national numbers in terms of the undercount of minorities and the overcount of those identifying as solely white also apply to Mississippi. And if that assumption is correct, that means Mississippi’s minority population grew during the past 10 years at a faster rate than originally thought.

Another report released by the Census Bureau as it was working on the 2020 Census indicated that about 27% of Mississippians live in hard-to-count neighborhoods. A map from the Census Bureau reveals most of those hard-to-count areas as being along the Mississippi River, where there are Black majority populations and in other areas with substantial minority populations. That research bolsters the argument of a significant undercount in Mississippi’s Black communities.

“We have always advocated for an accurate count and doubted the accuracy … of the numbers,” Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann wrote on social media of Mississippi’s undercount.

He added, “Our office is working now to gain clarity on the impact of this undercount and any steps which can be taken to mitigate it.”

In reality, there is not much that can be done.

In the 1990s during the Bill Clinton administration, census officials argued that by using the statistical sampling of households and other more advanced technology they could deliver a more accurate population count than what is ascertained by the traditional manual count. Republicans at the time opposed using the technology. The Supreme Court supported the Republican argument saying that the Constitution required an actual manual count be conducted to develop the official census.

The result of that ruling, among others, is the current undercount for Mississippi.

The post Mississippi has more people and is most likely more diverse than the 2020 Census reported appeared first on Mississippi Today.

HATTIESBURG — Huge, gold-clad crowds turned out this weekend ready to party at Pete Taylor Park. After all, the home team, Southern Miss, had won the Conference USA regular season championship by three full games and entered the league tournament with a No. 7 RPI rating and an excellent chance to become a national top-8 seed in the NCAA Tournament that begins next week.

All the Golden Eagles had to do was take care of their business.

That was then.

This is now: UTSA – the University of Texas at San Antonio – dumped bucket after bucket of ice water on that would-be party, knocking the Golden Eagles off twice and out of the tournament. After edging the Eagles 7-6 on Friday, the Roadrunners completely throttled the home team 11-2 on Saturday. The drubbing was the worst for Southern Miss in more than two seasons.

So now we will see how much winning the regular season championship handily in the nation’s fifth best conference means in the eyes of the NCAA Baseball Selection committee. We’ll see what an excellent 43-16 overall record means. And we’ll see how much losing twice to a red-hot team at home affects all that.

Certainly, Southern Miss lost any chance at a national seed. Now we’ll see if the Golden Eagles will host an NCAA Regional for only the third time in history when the tournament begins next week.

The guess here is that they will. A 2-2 record in a league tournament should not wipe out an entire season’s body of work. Lest we forget, Mississippi State went two-and-out – and was 10-run-ruled twice in last year’s SEC Tournament. All the Bulldogs did then was win the national championship.

The 2022 tournament sites will be announced Sunday. The pairings will be announced Monday morning.

This much is certain: The Golden Eagles must play better next week than they did Saturday or their NCAA experience will be short-lived no matter where they play. UTSA banged out 15 hits – six for extra bases – en route to the nine-run victory margin. The Roadrunners took a 4-0 lead after three innings, received a brief scare when the Golden Eagles rallied for two runs – that easily could have been more in the seventh – and then finished the Eagles off with seven runs over the last two frames.

Meanwhile, Daniel Garza delivered on the mound for UTSA, pitching eight innings of remarkable relief to earn the victory. Said Southern Miss shortstop Dustin Dickerson, “Garza put his breaking pitches anywhere he wanted, spotted his fastball and kept us off balance all day. You have to give him credit. He was really, really good.”

Garza was, but hitting is the name of the game for UTSA, which sports a lineup that includes eight straight .300-plus hitters. Baby-faced cleanup hitter Ryan Flores is the best of the bunch, now 13 of 19 with three home runs and nine RBIs in five games against Southern Miss this season. In the two tournament victories over Southern Miss, Flores was 5-for-8 with a home run, a double and three RBIs. 

It seems clear UTSA earned one of the spots Ole Miss was hoping for in the NCAA Tournament field. Either Louisiana Tech or Old Dominion – and maybe both – might pass the Rebels, as well. Depending on which predictions you read, Ole Miss is either one of the last teams in or one of the last couple teams out. UTSA, now 38-19 and with a 9-9 record against Top 50 teams, presumably passed the Rebels in the NCAA pecking order. We will see.

Southern Miss? The Eagles are definitely in the tournament, no lower than a 2-seed. Will they host?

“I believe we will, I really do,” Southern Miss coach Scott Berry said. “I would hope the committee will take into consideration the entire body of work, rather than us going 2-2 in the the league tournament. I am proud of winning the league, proud of the 43-16 record.

“But no matter where we play – and I hope it’s here – we have to hit the reset button. We have to take a day off, put this one behind us and get ready for next week.”

Someone mentioned what happened with State last season – two and out and a miserable showing its league tournament and then an amazing, memorable run to a national championship.

“It’s a crazy game, a strange game,” Berry said. “It’s all about getting hot and playing your best at the right time. Well, for us. now is that time.”

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In March 2022, Mental Health America released its annual report on the state of mental health across the United States. Mississippi Today has aggregated data specific to the Magnolia State.

The latest Data Dive is State of Mind, a report of compiled statistics on the current state of mental health and health care in Mississippi. This analysis zooms in on several categories such as substance abuse disorder, major depression, lack of treatment related to health care coverage and more across the country and among adults and youth.

MHA uses a complex set of criteria to categorize and rank each state. Their overall ranking specifically weighs the prevalence of mental health issues in a state with an estimated rate of access to care to address those issues. Those states ranked 1-13 have a lower prevalence of mental illness and a higher rate of access to care, while those states ranked 39-51 show a higher prevalence of mental illness and a lower rate of access to care.

The data shows that Mississippi generally ranks lower in multiple categories related to the accessibility of mental health services for adults, including adults with any mental illness (AMI) who do not have health insurance. Notably, all thirteen states at the bottom of this ranking had not expanded Medicaid between 2018 and 2019. Mississippi’s percentage of uninsured adults with AMI is only preceded by:

Alabama (19.3% or 154,000)
Missouri (19.3% or 209,000)
Texas (21.5% or 759,000)

Furthermore, over 27 million American adults are going untreated for a mental illness or other mental health issues. Lack of insurance coverage contributes to this, but also a majority of people who do have coverage — 54% — still go untreated.

Over 70% of children in Mississippi with major depression did not receive treatment. That rate precedes even the national percentage, which is 60.3%. Texas is the state with the highest individual percentage of 73.1%.

READ MORE: ‘We got to get some help:’ Pandemic accelerates need for children’s mental health services

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CLEVELAND — Under beer bottle chandeliers and a Last Supper-style mural of the Blues masters, faculty and staff prepared for the fifth and final night of “Department Trivia” at Hey Joe’s, a dive-y bar just down Sunflower Road from Delta State University. 

The competition, one of several community events at Hey Joe’s, is exactly how it sounds. Every last Wednesday, from January to May, faculty (and some non-university regulars) vie on behalf of their department. At stake are two prizes: The “Stanley Cup,” a perforated metal sculpture named for its creator, Michael Stanley, a former art professor at Delta State, and a sweepstakes check for $1,000 in funding. 

Justin Huerta, the owner of Hey Joe’s, started the competition in 2009 with his friend and fellow Delta State grad Kirkham Povall. It was the Great Recession, and Huerta thought his regulars, who were largely faculty, would appreciate the money as the state made deep cuts to higher education. 

For his part, Povall said he just “wanted to hang out.” He volunteered to host when no one else wanted to.

“I’m just a guy who had time to do it,” he said during a break between questions Wednesday night.

“That’s like a lot of things in Cleveland,” interjected Don Allan Mitchell, an English professor at Delta State. “You get roped into it. And then it becomes your life.” 

Mitchell had arrived at Hey Joe’s a little after 7 p.m. wearing a Delta State shirt and baseball cap, both okra green. He was going to meet a professor in the history department, but they had stayed home to process the shooting in Uvalde, Texas.

At Delta State, Mitchell said school shootings remind faculty of Ethan Schmidt, a professor who was shot and killed on campus in 2015. He floated around before joining a team named “The Department of Irrelevant Studies” that had five members, including Jess Szot, a math teacher at Cleveland Central High School.

Trivia got started shortly after 8 p.m. The stakes could have been higher. All five teams knew the Athletic Department was going to win, as it had for the last two times. Teams accumulate points over the semester, and the Athletic Department, with 142 points heading into Wednesday’s round, had far outpaced its competitors. (Trailing in second: The Alumni Department with 104 points.) 

“It’s a war of attrition,” Mitchell said. 

The English department has won four times before, Mitchell said, and they’ve used the prize money for a scholarship in memory of Schmidt. In 2019, most of Mitchell’s teammates stopped playing regularly after catching another team (not the Athletic Department, Mitchell specified) checking their phone during a question. They could no longer ignore the “rampant cheating.” 

“We left in a huff,” he said. 

The Athletic Department had never won prior to 2019, so the origin of the team’s sudden rise and continued dominance has inspired speculation. Were they the ones Mitchell caught cheating? Or was it simply that the Athletic Department was the only team to show up every week?

“For $1,000, we could buy some new equipment, we’d make a lot of use of it,” said Campbell Saia, who plays for the Communications and Marketing Department. “But some departments don’t need it, like the Athletic Department.” 

To level the playing field, the hosts — Rachel “Rowdy” Carson and Ben Yarbrough — started asking fewer sports-related questions. On Wednesday, the categories were “words that start with L,” “name the cartoon character by its parents” and miscellaneous. 

The fourth and final round is always music, but that night it had a twist. Yarbrough introduced the “Esteemed Reverend” Josh Armstrong, a music professor at Delta State who had prepared renditions of 10 songs, from Nena to Justin Bieber, on a MIDI controller.  

In prior years, Armstrong (who is not actually a reverend) might’ve recorded the backing track with the help of the student steel drum band. He wasn’t able to put that together this year, though, due to “low enrollment” at Delta State. 

After Yarbrough scored the final round, a three-way tie emerged. The Department of Irrelevant Studies sent Szot, whose mom was in an 80s band. Armstrong played just two seconds of “Material Girl” before Szot’s hand shot up. She won the team a free pitcher of beer for the night, but the Athletic Department had won the tournament. 

“This should come as a surprise to no one, but the winner of the Stanley Cup is the Athletic Department,” Yarbrough said into a fuzzy red microphone.  

There were scattered claps and a single, half-hearted “woo.” 

At the bar, Ryan Tyler, a member of the Athletic Department team, discussed their winning steak, which he said is due to their size and diversity. The team plans to engrave the team’s name on the wooden base of the Stanley Cup, he said. They’re also considering displaying the cup in the trophy case on campus.

“I don’t know why we’d have to cheat,” Tyler said. “Like I said, we have the most diverse group of people.” 

As participants paid their tabs, Huerta, sitting near a row of arcade games, talked about the ethos behind Hey Joe’s. Born and raised in Cleveland, he’s sensitive to stereotypes about Mississippi. Hey Joe’s is his way of doing something about the realities of life here.

“I’m not gonna change Mississippi, I’m not gonna change the United States of America — my world is Cleveland, so I’m trying my best to change my world,” he said. 

As for the rumors of cheating? “We’ve never caught anybody,” he said, pausing to take a sip of his beer. “But we did have a shirt that said, ‘no cell phones.’”

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